Kurt fastened the Valor in Combat medal to the lapel of Sebastian’s uniform, its gold reflecting afternoon sunlight from the dorm window. “Good grief. Don’t you look all posh now?”
“Whatever,” Sebastian scoffed. “You should’ve gotten one, too.”
Kurt laughed and pointed out the ebon horns sprouting from his mop of pale hair.
“That guy’s getting angry.” Timothy pointed at the mountains in the distance as the ground shook beneath us.
We’d gotten out of school early after the quakes grew so strong, they knocked the books off the shelves.
“What guy?” I asked. Timothy was older and knew a lot of stuff,
Laurva was hungry. So very hungry.
And alone.
Suffocating darkness encased her. She was completely sealed in. Instinct overruled her uncertainty, and the gloom diffused as she gnawed the walls.
Chomp. Chew. Gulp. Smack. Swallow. She emerged, surrounded by sickening sounds of others feeding.
I’m not alone. This awareness wasn’t comforting, but hunger drove her out.
Morning light filtered through the jungle mist, bedewing the dirt below and the life teeming within it. Kithoor adjusted her weight in the saddle and pressed her bare, malachite-hued legs against the sides of her mount. Snorting, the scaly, barbed monstrosity turned its crested head. He clawed the mud and bellowed.
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I haven’t found the right universe yet.
“What do you think?” Cleo’s feet squish into the swampy ground with each step.
I peer through the tiny tear in the fabric of our universe. On the other side is a different world––blanketed in reddish stone with deep canyons and majestic mountains.
“Well?” Cleo demands.
“Where is he?”
“In the well.”
Lark and his wife, Shera, step out of their hovel and into the blistering sun. He places his hand on her shoulder.
“He’ll be safe there,” Lark whispers as they make their way toward the crowd gathering on the outskirts of their village. Just beyond, a massive skyship hovers
I trudged down the aisle, eyes on the ground. I could not face the countrymen who stood on either side of me, judging. Instead, I counted their shoes. Twenty-nine people to witness my fate.
I slowed when my father’s calfskin-covered feet came into view. Beside him, the monstrous boots of my betrothed rested in the snow.
Shirl Crabfelter rehearsed three rules daily as she donned the counter-girl’s top for Shady Grove Deli & Vendorama.
1. Don’t wake Ernhert if he was drinking.
2. Don’t show up late for your shift at the Vendorama.
3. Don’t pay any mind to the angels on the roof.
Drums. Their song echoes through the valley. The ground beneath my feet quivers with each beat, and my heart pounds in rhythm with the melody of war, pumping adrenaline through my twitching muscles.
Fear. Its claws dig into my chest, scratching my lungs with every breath I take and squeezes my heart with an iron grip.
When fleeing the country, was it normal to feel like a rat stuck on a skinny branch above a pack of snarling wolves?
Even though tonight I would leave forever, I swept dust off the floors, checked for cobwebs in the spick-and-span nooks and corners, and comforted myself that I would no longer face this tangle of shelves, gadgets, and shadows every evening.
Three of the dragon’s heads lunged, spewing noxious fire. Niccolò bellowed, charged between columns of flame, and drove at the beast with his axe. His blows glanced off the scales, then he staggered against the flags of the old church as four more heads lurched around the corner.
Where was Giovanni?
Tad’s gut knotted. He’s all I have …Images of his brother’s ashen face flooded his mind. If this doesn’t work, he’ll die by the end of the week. “Dust and specter, shadow and …” Blast it if I get killed from reciting this password wrong to the witch. He sidestepped oily puddles along Gidras’s docks. “Shadow and …shifter?” How did Gratia say it again?
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